Sylar spun in his lone allotted chair almost idly.
There was nothing else to do until Luke began the next phase of their plan. Now all that was left was finding some enjoyment in the bolted-to-the-floor spinning chair in this circular room with a television that wasn't working, again, and walls painting scenes of joyful, childish-style fields of flowers in primary colors.
It was depressing.
He stilled, cocking his head. Footsteps. He grinned. He recognized those steps; this room wasn't exactly padded for sound. He jumped down from the chair and slid under the viewing window on the door seconds before it was uncovered, the chair left spinning slowly in his wake.
A few seconds passed.
"Hey! Where is he?!"
Sylar couldn't resist this mundane pleasure; he popped up to stand at full height. "Boo!"
Noah Bennet, Warden of Mercy City Prison, made a startled sound of protest and Sylar laughed.
"Good morning, Warden!" He greeted in a sing-song voice before lazily lounging back on the chair. "I have great news for you and the rest of the city. I'm a changed man and I'm ready to re- enter society as a contributing citizen."
Bennet was unimpressed. "You're a villain, Sylar; you'll always be one. You'll never change and you'll never leave here."
He smirked. "Same old, same old. You're fun."
"You actually received something through the mail today," Bennet continued on smoothly, holding up a small gift-wrapped box. Sylar leaned forward expectantly while he opened it, revealing a watch. His favorite watch. "It's from Mercy Man. 'To count every second of your 85 life sentences.' Well, I never thought of Mercy Man as the gloating type but he does have nice taste in watches. I think I'll keep it until you get out."
Sylar pretended to not be so affronted by the momentary stealing. It was necessary. "Before you leave, can you give me time? I don't want to be late for the opening of the Mercy Man museum."
Bennet lifted it up as he slipped it onto his wrist. "Look at that — you're going to miss it by several thousand years. Too bad."
"I am?" His smirk widened to a shark-like grin and he watched the window close back over as Bennet walked away. Now all he had to do was count the minutes instead of the hours. And then everything would go according to plan. He began to spin the chair again.
The downtown square was filled to the brim with one massive, jovial crowd of people and Claire found herself on the edge of it, where a side street met the one-way that ran around the large reflecting pool. Eric gave a thumbs-up and she began.
"Happy Mercy Man Day, Mercy City! It's a bright day in our beautiful downtown, where we're here at Central Square to honor Mercy Man. His empathy is like an ocean surrounding our island of citizenry. For years he's been watching us with his super vision, saving us and caring for us with his quick action. Today we have the opportunity to give something back.
"This is Claire Petrelli, reporting live from the dedication of the Mercy Man museum."
She counted two beats, hearing the reporters sitting at desks back in the studio bidding her farewell and promising further coverage after the break, and then she make a throat slitting motion to Eric. He flicked off the recording and lowered the camera from his shoulder. "The stuff they make you read on air, Blondie — it's crazy."
Claire furrowed her brows above an awkward smile, trying not to take that personally. "I wrote that piece myself, Eric."
She got her confirmation of the intended condescension when his eyes widened and he began to verbally back pedal. She twisted the microphone in her hands, longing to finish this up and anonymously go join the crowds of happy citizens. "What I was trying to say is that I can't believe that in this day and age, they let you speak such elegant poetry on the news."
"Good save, Eric."
"Why don't we go grab a coffee and hang out after this?"
Claire set the microphone in the back of the van, next to where he was starting to pack up the camera. Their next shot would be from the other side of the square; she wanted to get all angles. "We can't leave — come on, it's time to get into the Mercy Man Day spirit! Don't you want to participate in any of the activities?"
"Well if I were Mercy Man, Sylar wouldn't be kidnapping you all the time. I cannot feel very excited about him if that's the first thing I would do and he still hasn't."
"That's sweet, Eric. But it's okay; really. And I'm not kidnapped now, am I?" Claire smiled as she thought about the recurring situation. She didn't mind the whole thing anymore, not when it hardly lasted a couple hours and only mildly inconvenienced her day once every couple of months, but it was nice to hear something so matter-of-fact and protective from an outside perspective.
There wasn't much Mercy Man could do about it, since Sylar was so determined, and Sylar never
actually hurt her or even manhandled her. Okay, the first couple times had been emotionally traumatic because being on the receiving end of things like chloroform are not fun, but she adjusted. She was good at that.
Eric continued, though. "I'm serious. I would keep a constant eye on you in case he tried anything — like a dingo watches a human baby." She winced. "Okay, that sounded— that sounded a little strange."
"Uh, a little bit, yes."
He climbed into the van to put the camera case back, amongst other things. "See, now you're making a weird face and that's making me feel weird. I'm only thinking of your well being here, Blondie. The point is—"
Claire folded her arms, wishing that Eric sometimes knew when to stop. He didn't have the greatest social filter. Her wishing didn't matter, however, as she felt a prick against her neck one second and then she was faced with blackness in the next.
Sylar heard commotion outside of his door just shy of eighteen minutes later. He quickly ducked behind the chair. The door opened a minute later, two guards manhandling Bennet — who was morphed to appear as Sylar — and pushing him into the chair. Sylar kept as much watch on them as he could in the precarious situation, managing to reach out and steal his watch back when the guards were busy with Bennet's feet restraints.
Finally. It felt good to have this gem back.
"No, you idiots! He's tricked you."
The guards looked up at their warden's words but they were too late. Sylar was already at the door behind them. "You were right." He turned the dials of the watch and in a second he was morphed into the Warden. He laughed. "I'll always be the villain!"
Sylar shut the door on them, striding down the halls confidently. He fit right in by just acting like his usual self. Who knew. He waved to the gate guard outside before stepping up to the sidewalk curb, waiting for Luke. To his surprise, his minion was already there, rolling the passenger side window of the invisible car down.
"Why hello, sir! Need a lift?"
He smirked. "Yes I do, you reliable minion."
Sylar slammed the door shut behind him, rolling his eyes at Luke's giddiness, even as he felt the same within him. The gate guard ran into the street when they sped off, realizing too late that something was wrong.
"You're free!"
"Nice wok sending me the watch, Luke," Sylar praised.
"You got it, boss!"
"Is Claire Petrelli in the back?"
Luke's hologram head nodded, appearance becoming blurred for a moment. "Bound and unconscious."
"Good. Our plan is working perfectly."
With most of the people in the city either at the downtown square or in their homes watching feed from the before mentioned square, Sylar and Luke made it to their evil lair on the edge of the city in a third of the time it usually took.
It was placed in the warehouse district, lest anyone be nearby to find a man with brooding large eyebrows, and a robot with a hologram face for a head, suspicious. Not to mention the short blonde woman they pulled out of the previously-invisible car's trunk. That, however, was done inside of the evil lair's garage, so it didn't actually count.
Luke threw her over his shoulder as Sylar rushed inside to change out of his disgusting orange prison jumper and into his more appropriate black garb and cape.
He appeared back in the center of the vast warehouse, finding Luke easily. "How do I look, minion? Do I look evil?"
"Disgustingly horrifying, sir," Luke confirmed with an approving grin.
"Perfect." Sylar glanced to Claire's form as he rubbed his hands together in power-hungry anticipation. He was caught off guard when he thoughts wandered. He liked that dress; it was flattering on her. He cleared his throat a brief second later when he noticed his minion waiting eagerly. "Now to the laughing!"
Luke followed his lead quickly as they bound up the steps to the auditorium, laughing obnoxiously loud in order to wake Claire Petrelli. It was always how the game worked and when she made the first coming-to groan, Sylar grinned.
"Places, places."
He sat in the swivel chair at the console, whistling for one of his floating, cat-shaped bot
inventions to come over. It purred in his grip when he pulled it into his lap, facing away from where Luke was setting Claire down in the wooden straight-back chair they'd placed under a garish spotlight.
It had been months since they last did this and Sylar missed it. He could barely push back the excitement from showing but then he smoothed his fingers over his eyebrows and, just like that, he set his face in a neutral, borderline menacing mask. He was ready.
"Would it kill you to wash the bag, Eyebrows?" Was the first thing out of her mouth when he heard Luke pull said bag off her head.
Sylar spun around dramatically to face her, ignoring the earlier nickname jab. She raised an eyebrow. "Miss Petrelli. We meet again."
"Well you kind of kidnapped me, so, yeah."
"You can scream all you want, Claire!" He said before realizing how much annoyance filled her comment. He faltered briefly before continuing. "No one can hear you!"
She yawned.
He scowled to his minion. "Why isn't she screaming? You're supposed to be helping." Luke bristled as if he'd been slapped. "Uh, Miss Petrelli—"
"Like this," Sylar demonstrated with a theatre-esque scream, making a whole production out of it as he gripped onto the bot in his arms tightly and threw his head back. He shrugged after. "But that's a weak girl's scream."
The cat bot, in retaliation to unwanted squeezing, chose that moment to bite his arm with its metal jaw. Sylar truly screamed this time and none too proudly. He shook off the bot with a glare and it went flying away.
"That's much better," Claire observed with a taunting grin before swiveling her head around. "Huh. This is a new room. You know, I've been meaning to ask — is there some kind of geeky super villain website where you two get the Tesla coils and blinking dials? They can't all do something. You're too pathetic for that."
"Actually, most of it comes from an outlet store in—" Luke began. Sylar objected, horrified.
"Don't answer that!"
His minion seemed to ponder that before whispering, "Romania."
Sylar groaned. "Stop! She's using her investigative reporting skills on your weak-willed mind in order to find out all our tricks." He stood as he talked, sauntering over and placing his hands on the arms of the chair she was in. Luke, meanwhile, huffed at the allegation of stupidity. He was an artificial intelligence life form, after all. Sylar smirked at her. "Such tricks won't work on me—"
Claire mimicked his leaning forward, adopting a mock smirk of her own. "Wow, talk slower, these compliments are really making my day."
"—Temptress!"
She threw her head back and laughed. "Honestly, Sylar, what secrets could I find? You're predictable in the worst ways."
"Predictable?" He repeated with a shout. Turning, he swiftly stepped back over to the console and grabbed a lever. "Do you call this predictable?!"
Paneling around her chair revealed a water pit underneath where alligators laid amongst bright plastic toys. At the intrusion, they got up and began to snap their jaws. Luke managed to step to the side in time. Claire pursed her lips at the alligators. "Yeah, I was thinking about this on the way over. Actually thought it would be sharks — are those more expensive?"
'What's this?!"
A machine gun came out of the wall, rolling its barrel dramatically as it warmed up. Claire didn't even look over at it. "Yep. Boring."
"This?!"
A spinning series of blades came down from the ceiling, whirling around her. "Okay that's just juvenile — it's literally in every boy's dreams. Do you still wear matching pajama sets? Tell me you do!"
"The horror!" Sylar announced as one of the blades came out, taking off a strand of her long hair.
Claire actually reacted this time; she glared at him. "Oh come on! I just got a haircut."
He so did not feel about about that. Not one bit. "What does this one do?!" He asked instead, pushing a yellow button.
"Flames?" She asked before the jet began to work properly. Then she just wore a smug expression framed by her new shoulder-length blonde do. "I told you. Predictable." He hit the button again to turn it off and, facing the console, face-palmed himself.
"Let's stop wasting time and call your Eagle Scout boyfriend already. Minion!" "Right away." Luke joined him at the console.
Sylar pretended to be focusing in great consternation, ignoring Claire's own bit-off, "He's not— forget it."